A Drunken Guest

[Bharathi1]

We started Airbnb from last sep 2019. This home is brand new home and all our guests (well most of them) were super pleased with the home and our hosting. Last night we had a late reservation say for room A. We had this guest before couple of times and had no issues. I usually avoid late night bookings since I don't live in this place. I some how was hesitant to approve the request even though I knew this guest. He came in late around 2.30 AM and my ring video at the entry shows he was super drunk and cant even enter the key code and trying to push open the door.  Like around 3.30 am ish I think he started going room to room and banging on the doors. one of our guest say room B was their first time Airbnb booking was traumatized and called 911 and took their help to vacate the place. this whole drama went up till 5 am and since I don't live in that property I didn't know until 6 am in the morning.

We were loving hosting and receiving amazing reviews till now. My husband is not comfortable anymore to neither rent it or Airbnb. Our listing does mention no drugs no visitors no loud music etc. etc. Technically this guest didn't break any rules as we didn't mention no banging on other room doors or waking up people but it is all just commonsense. I would like to reach out to amazing hosts to see what would you do differently to avoid such guests. Also, few guests move in and out all night either it could be for smoke or whatever reason. I usually don't like / prefer them go in out of the home late in the nights and disturbing neighborhood. Please roll out your ideas and thoughts so that I can convince my husband to start Airbnb again. I know its too much to ask for perfect guests all the time but we did have amazing guests very polite very friendly but we also dealt with few sour guests as well very demanding. writing to the community definitely helps reducing the anxiety. 

[Anonymous]

@Bharathi1You have rooms occupied by multiple guests, unacquainted with each other, sharing a house without a host or co-host on site to oversee it?

I'm afraid I have to side with your husband on this one. It's not your fault that Guest A was drunk and disorderly, but when you have a bunch of strangers thrust together in an unsupervised house with self check in, you've got a recipe for disaster. 

It's not realistic to impose a curfew or attempt to control adults' behavior by saying "don't do drugs" or whatever. In this case, the arrangement itself is the problem. Either rent the entire home to one group of guests at a time, or have a dedicated co-host on site conducting in-person check ins, maintaining common areas, mediating conflicts between guests and looking after their safety. 

[Mike-And-Jane0]

@Bharathi1 I totally agree with Andrew. Either rent the house as a two bed or have a one bed and a two bed listing and lock the 2nd bedroom if the one bed option is taken.

[Anonymous]

@Mike-And-Jane0   Another option I can imagine working:  choose a trustworthy long-term tenant for one room and offer a rent discount or commission in exchange for them co-hosting the second room as an Airbnb. 

[Laura2592]

I hate to blame a host but yes, this hosting situation has so much potential for danger. What if a guest assaults another? No way would I opt to stay in such a place as a woman. There needs to be some direct onsite oversight if you are planning to continue with this model. 

Consider this a gentle warning from the universe. If you don't take heed of this annoying but fairly innocuous situation, it will get worse. Drunk guests are not uncommon. Just be glad he was pretty harmless overall. 

[Huma0]

@Bharathi1 

I agree with the other comments already posted. It would make much more sense for you to rent this property out as an entire unit, if you local laws allow you to do this and don't limit it to the extent where it would be unprofitable (e.g. in London, we can only Airbnb an entire unit for maximum 90 nights a year).

If that is not possible, I think @Anonymous 's suggestion of a long-term lodger in one of the rooms is great.

I also would not allow such late night check ins and, yes, one would think it was common sense to know you shouldn't bang on doors in the middle of the night, but I've learnt you need to cover yourself as much as possible with your house rules as Airbnb may look at them if you need to evict a guest/file a claim. It would be perfectly reasonable to have a rule that covers keeping noise down after a certain hour (mine say 11pm) and NOT disturbing other guests.

[Debra300]

@Huma0,

I am curious and have questions regarding the following comment that you made,

"...(e.g. in London, we can only Airbnb an entire unit for maximum 90 nights a year).".

This situation is unlike back in the when my friend's daughter was caught by the TV license people that drove around with instruments to gauge if signals were being generated in homes which hadn't paid the tax, how is the hosting limited tracked and verified?  Does the City expected hosts to stop hosting or self-report when the limit has been reached? 

[Huma0]

@Debra300 

I believe in London it is the remit of the local councils but, when I couldn't find any information on my council's website. I did look quite a while ago, so maybe there is something there now. How they enforce it, I have no idea, but I believe this rule is designed more to stop large-scale property developers with many listings etc. from taking over the rental market. We do have a housing crisis in London. So, I don't think the councils would be particularly interested in small-scale hosts renting out one property, but I could be wrong.

However, Airbnb DO enforce this. If you have an entire unit listing in London, as soon as you reach 90 nights of bookings, the rest of the year's calendar will be blocked. I had a friend who stopped renting his house on Airbnb because of this.

Of course, that's not to say you couldn't take 90 days of bookings on Airbnb and then try to fill the rest of the calendar using other listing sites. I doubt Airbnb would be double checking that. They have implemented the 90 day block on their system and therefore can say they have complied with the city's regulations so that box is ticked.

[Helen3]

It is actually the remit of Airbnb to ensure that London hosts can't provide more than 90 days a year by blocking them from doing so, if they have a whole listing on their site.

Unscrupulous hosts and property management companies have found ways around the ban of course.

The legislation was introduced by the government https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2015/20/notes/division/5/46 @Debra300 and it is monitored by local councils in London.

Large fines and criminal action can by taken against hosts and property managers  who try and get around the regulations.

[Huma0]

@Helen3 

It's interesting because there are lots of companies out there managing Airbnbs for hosts. You see lots of ads on the tube and they put flyers through my door all the time but I have never contacted them because they only manage whole properties. 

I wonder if they are sticking to the 90 day rule or not. They do advertise along the lines of 'make money from your home while you holiday' but I have met people who have used them to Airbnb second homes in London...

[Debra300]

@Huma0,

Thank you for such a comprehensive response.  Airbnb has implemented a systematic hard stop at 90 days of stay to fulfill their compliance responsibility.  I list my spaces on multiple OTAs, and I don't believe that the calendar syncing feature differentiates non-reservation blocked dates from dates with bookings.  So, a host does have the ability to get around the 90 day limit by accepting reservations from more than one OTA and through direct bookings.  

[Bharathi1]

Thanks all for time and inputs.